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Performers

The St Petersburg Symphony Orchestra is one of the leading symphony orchestras of Russia, tonight conducted by its Chief Conductor Alexander Dmitriev and joined by English pianist Peter Donohoe for a programme of masterpieces by Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov.

The evening’s programme opens with one of the most famous love themes in the world played by an orchestra full of Russian intensity and passion.

Rachmaninov composed four piano concertos over the course of his career and was the soloist at the premiere of each. The Fourth Concerto is a work very much of its time, incorporating not only the remnants of late Romanticism but also some up-to-date sounds of Ravel and Gershwin, reflecting Rachmaninov’s musical curiosity and evolving style.

The programme culminates in the orchestral passion and brilliance of Tchaikovsky’s final symphony, the ‘Pathétique’.